Dissertation Oral Defenses


Candidate: Sherrie Sims Allen Date: May 4, 2015 Time: 3:00 pm

This research study offers a revisioning of Black women’s rage, which is typically viewed as a destructive emotion offering no value to modern society. Through the use of multiple methodologies—alchemical hermeneutics, literary textual analysis, and a focus group—and examined through the theoretical lenses of depth psychology, mythology, Black feminism, and Black women’s literature, this dissertation…


Candidate: Agnes M. Regeczkey Date: May 3, 2015 Time: 4:00 pm

The purpose of this research is to better understand the birth of psychoanalytic theories in the context of collaboratory and adversarial relationships. From the 1920’s, there were seminal papers that revealed theoretical variances which impacted collegial relationships and vice versa. Melanie Klein’s theoretical identity attracted attention as she transformed her observations of child play into…


Candidate: Katherine Marsai Date: April 27, 2015 Time: 1:00 pm

Hidden within the many distractions of our modern day culture are people who have faced some of the darkest aspects of life and its unthinkable circumstances.  These same people have also triumphed over their difficulties in extraordinary ways.  This qualitative research dissertation explores the deep structure of numinous events in times of crisis and how…


Candidate: Angie Nicole Branham Date: April 19, 2015 Time: 1:00 pm

Anorexia nervosa has been viewed as a culturally “Western” and modern disorder. Few researchers have seen the pattern of starvation in women as a violent protest in opposition to the devaluation of the feminine principle. This demonstration is directed toward one’s self and acted out against the body. Today, we see anorexia as a struggle…


Candidate: Julie Elizabeth Yau Date: April 12, 2015 Time: 4:00 pm

The central hypothesis of this dissertation is that when an infant undergoes severe trauma, a phenomenon similar to the state of tonic immobility occurs, a concept that defines a reaction often observed in animals when faced with immediate danger. In psychological terms, one can observe what happens when the core self splits from the body,…


Candidate: Vicky Jo Varner Date: Time: 10:00 am

Jung’s theory of psychological types has often been marginalized by traditional Jungians for its complexity, misuse, opaqueness, and lack of depth. A proliferation of personality assessments exacerbates this shortcoming by operationalizing Jung’s theory through the introduction of quantitative measures. Scant attention has been paid to the relevance of psychological types with respect to unconscious aspects…


Candidate: Odette J. Springer Date: Time:

The Navajo deity, Changing Woman is not well known in the pantheon of goddesses, but she is everywhere. She is Earth, Feminine Creator, spirit, Feminine Spirit, Holy Spirit, breath, voice, the “Wisdom Feminine of the Old Testament, Ruach of Judaic thought, The Shekinah of the Cabbalists, Sophia of Gnosticism” (Moon, “Changing Woman” 164-165). She represents…


Candidate: Patricia C. Patrick Date: Time:

This research seeks to deepen understanding of the body’s role in becoming conscious. Using literary hermeneutic methodology with a somatic depth psychological lens this dissertation interprets materials from the disciplines of depth psychology, developmental theory, neuroscience/affective neurobiology and psychopharmacology. Integrating these areas of expertise supports the understanding that the body is the essential source of…